COOPERS-HILL. A POEM, Written by the Honourable Knight of the Bath. LONDON: Printed and Sold by H. Hills, in Black-Fryers, TO THE KING SIR, A Fter the delivery of Your Royal Father's Perfen into the hands of the Army, I undertaking to the Queen Mother, that I would find Some means to get access to him she was pleased to fend me, and by the help of Hugh Peters Igot my admittance, and coming well inftructed from the Queen (his Majefty having been long kept in the dark) he was pleafed to difcourfe very freely with me of the whole ftate of his Affairs: But, Sir, I will not launch into a Hiftory, instead of an Epifile. One morning waiting on him at Caufham, Smiling upon me, he faid he could tell me fome News of my felf, which was, that he had seen fome Verfes of mine the Evening before (being thofe to Sir Richard Fanfhaw) and asking me when I made them, I told him two or three years fince; he was pleased to fay, that having never seen them before, He was afraid I had written them fince my return into England, and though he liked them well, He would advise me to write no more, alledging, that when men are young, and have little elfe to do, they might vent the overflowings of their Fancy that way; but when they were thought fit for more ferious Employments, if they fill perfifted in that course, it would look as if they minded not the way to any better. Whereupon I food corrected as long as I had the honour to wait upon him, and at his departure from Hampton Court, he was pleased to command me to stay privately at London, to fend to him and receive from him all his Letters from and to all bis Correfpondents at home and abroad, and I was furnish'd with nine feveral Cyphers in order to it: Which trust I performed with great fafety, to the perfons with whom we corresponded; but about nine months after being discovered by their knowledge of Mr. Cowley's Hand I happily escaped both for my self, and those that held correspondence with me; that time was too hot and bufie for fuch idle Speculations, but after I had the good fortune to wait upon Your Majesty in Holland and France, You were pleased sometimes to give me Arguments to divert and put off the evil hours of our Banifhment, which now and then fell not short of Your Majefty's expectation. After, when Your Majefty departing from St. Germans to Jerly, was pleafed freely (without my asking) to confer upon me that place wherein I have now the honour to ferve You, I then gave over Poetical Lines A 2 and The Epiftle Dedicatory. and made it my business to draw fuch others as might be more ferviceable to Your Majefty, and I hope more lasting. Since that time I never disobeyed my old Mafter's Commands till this Summer at the Wells my Retirement there tempting me to divert thofe melancholy Thoughts, which the new Apperitions of Foreign Invafion, and Domeftick Discontent gave us : But thefe Clouds being now happily blown over, and our Sun clearly fhining out again, I have recovered the Relapfe, it being fufpected that it would bave proved the Epidemical Disease of Age, which is apt to fall back into the Folies in Youth; yet Socrates, Ariftotle and Cato did the fame, and Scaliger faith that Fragment of Aristotle was beyond any thing that Pindar or Homer ever wrote I will not call this a Dedication, for those Epiftles are commonly greater Abfurdities than any that come after: For bat Author can reasonably believe, that fixing the great Name of fome eminent Patron in the Forehead of his Book can charm away Cenfure, and that the firft Leaf fhould be a Curtain to draw over and hide all the deformities that and behind it? Neither have I any need of fach shifts, for moft of the Parts of this Body have already had your Majefty's View, and having past the Teft of so clear and sharp fighted a Judgment, which has as good a Title to give Law in Matters of this Nature as in any other, they who spill presume to diffent from Your Majesty, will do more wrong to their own Judgment, thin their Judgment can do to me. And for thofe latter Parts which have not yet received your Majesty's favourable Aspect, if they who have seen them do not fitter me, (for I dare not truft my own Judgment) they will make it appear, that it is not with me as with most of Mankind who never forfake their Darling Vices, till their Vices forfake them; and that this Divorce was not Frigiditatis causâ, but an Act of Choice, and not of Nec-ity Therefore, Sir, I fall only call it an bumble Petition, That Your Majesty will please to pardon this new Amour to my old Mirefs. and my Disobedience to his Commands, to whofe Memory I look upon with great Reverence and Devotion, and making a feriouus Refection upon that wife Advice, it carries much greater weight with it now than when it was given, fr when Age and Experience has fo ripened Man's Difcresion as to make it fit for use, either in private or publick affairs, nothing blafts and corrupts the Fruit of it so much as the empty, airy Riputation of being nimis Poeta; and therefore I shall take my leave of the Muses, as two of my Predeceffors did, faying, Splendidis longum vale dico nugis, Your Majesty's most faithful S COOPERS-HILL. URE there are Poets which did never dream Of Helicon; we therefore may fuppofe Those made not Poets, but the Poet those. And as Courts make not Kings, but Kings the Court, Nor wonder, if (advantag'd in my Flight, Aspiring Mountain, or defcending Cloud: Paul's the late Theme of fuch a Mufe whofe Flight M.W Now fhalt thou ftand, though Sword, or Time, or Fire, Under |